


A LOVER'S SONG

by AgnesClementine



Series: FIGHTERS OF THE GOOD FIGHT [5]
Category: Supernatural, The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-01-31 09:09:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18588154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AgnesClementine/pseuds/AgnesClementine
Summary: Dean is leaving soon and Diego doesn't know when they'll see each other again, but there's also something going on with Allison.





	1. 1.

**Author's Note:**

> This part is absolutely zero case, but there's a surprise sneak peek into Dean's POV ;)

_He feels heavy. Like there’s a warm sort of weariness seeping in his bones, keeping him grounded, too tired to move his limbs. He can hear voices talking around him, a whole cacophony of them, and something warm and alive shifting against him._

_He wills his eyes to open._

_Six is reading a book on his sofa. Seven is squished next to him, tiny and curled up in his side, reading over his shoulder. They both look tired but settled comfortably._

_He gets jostled again, something pointy jabbing between his ribs, and grunts. There’s a squeak, a shout of his number, and then the weight settles on him more firmly, pushing him into the mattress. A hug. He’s being hugged._

_He vaguely notices the sound of what he came to describe as vacuum sucking in the spare space, always present during Five’s space jumps._

_“You’re awake!” Four yells, squeezing him, as Three says, “Keep still!”_

_He looks down over his bed to see Three painting Four’s toenails, curly hair tied back in a loose ponytail. She gives him a brief, genuine smile, and then scowls at Four, poking at his squirming leg._

_Next to her, with back against his night drawer, One is dozing off. He jabs an uncoordinated finger at his face._

_One startles with a flinch, blinking up at him._

_Despite being Two’s kin in sleeping in late, One always makes an effort to tag along with others when they’ve got their day off. Day off being the only day when the siblings are free to do whatever they please, from the moment they wake up to the moment they sink into sleep (usually painfully after their curfew)._

_So as they wake up, they pile into the room of one person that is still sleeping and just hang out in their room until they wake up. Most mornings, Mom finds them like this, crammed in Two’s room. It’s amazing, really, because people would expect that Four would be the one sleeping past his alarm, but then again, Four has a wonderful ability to fall asleep_ everywhere _. If Two hadn’t found him napping in every crook and cranny of the house, he’d be worried his brother is not getting enough sleep._

_“Oh,” One starts, breaking off into a yawn, “you’re awake.”_

_Two grumbles because, yes, they’ve established that already._

_“So grumpy,” Seven teases quietly, lips quirking up a bit more to make sure Two’s sleep-foggy brain recognizes it as a joke._

_He grumbles again, the noise drowned out by Five reappearing with a whoosh and a brief flash of blue. He shoves a bowl of cereal in his face, saying, “We already had breakfast. You really slept in late today.”_

_Two wriggles into a sitting position- earning a yelp from Four and a short glare from Three- and accepts the bowl, feeling the warmth radiating from the ceramic._

_“Thanks,” he says before shoveling a spoonful in his mouth. The cereal is not soggy, so it must have been freshly made either by Mom or Five himself- both sends a warm sensation traveling over his skin and settling in his stomach._

_As he eats, Five settles on the bed next to him, drawing a cool caricature of One holding a truck above his head like a weight, equations that Two can’t really make sense of scribbled on the margins. Whenever his arm brushes Two’s, he feels tiny sparks of electric charge jump against his skin. On his other side, Four is practically vibrating with energy, ready to take on the day with vigor._

_Two watches them while he eats, only fleeting glances here and there but happiness is palpable in the air- timid and subtle, but still. However shit their week is, they can always count on being able to breathe that one day._

_A week and a half later, Five disappears._

  * ●●●●



Diego wakes up from the achingly familiar and vivid dream (memory, really) to blink at the darkness, feeling ghostly pinpricks of electricity travel up his arms. He shoves his head into the pillow for a second, until his mind processes what his eyes saw crouching in front of his bed. _A fucking person_.

He strikes out, heartbeat suddenly picking up, but his wrist is caught and with an uncoordinated tug from both sides, he tumbles out of his bed, into a tangle of limbs. There’s a groan, a hissed out swear and his name spoken into the night as he’s pushed to his back, an arm bracing his forearms, preventing him from attacking again.

He looks towards the intruder, squinting at the outline of Dean’s face, illuminated by moonlight reaching in through the window.

“Dean,” he whispers, “what the fuck?”

Dean gives him one of his charming, ‘whoopsie-what-can-you-do’ smiles and says, like it’s not a middle of the night, “Hi, fancy seeing you here.”

Diego blinks to restrain himself from smacking him upside the head, “You’re in my house.”

“Uh, yeah.”

“In the middle of the night.”

“It’s actually half past two,” Dean says, pointing at his alarm clock on the bedside drawer.

Diego levels him with an unimpressed look, “You know what I meant.”

And then he swats his arm away and gets up, Dean following. He gives his room a quick, subtle once over, making sure nothing compromising is in sight. Not that Dean wouldn’t have a chance to see if there was anything like that before Diego woke up. As it is, there is only a pile of clothes in the hamper in the corner, ready to be picked up for washing tomorrow.

“Seriously, what are you doing here?”

Dean shrugs, looking around as well, “You know, checking how things are, the usual.”

Diego arches his eyebrows at him, “Um, phone?”

Dean tilts his head to the side as if to say “yeah, sure” but he’s still scanning his eyes over Diego’s room, throwing a look at Diego every now and then as well. Weird.

Diego lets him be for a moment more, then says, “I’m getting myself a glass of water, want something?” because he doubts he’s getting back to sleep tonight.

Vaguely, with a hint of horror, he wonders if Dean saw Mom, recharging in her small foyer, and how would Diego explain it if he did.

 _Oh, that’s just my mom, recharging her batteries. Literally_.

“I’ll go with you,” Dean tells him.

Diego frowns once again but doesn’t protest.

They sneak through the hallway, cloaked in half darkness, and down the stairs strangely undetected. Suspiciously so, if Diego’s being honest. Dad turned off the surveillance cameras sometime last year (Diego knows because he used to hide in the recording room when nightmares would sneak up on him and he’d need a space to collect himself and make sure everyone is alright), so the only way they can be caught is if they stumble upon Allison and/or Luther.

Diego is still not sure if he’s hiding them from Dean, or if he’s hiding Dean from them. But either way, he doesn’t want those two parts of his world to clash, at least not yet.

They slink into the kitchen and Diego grabs two glasses out of the cupboard and fills them with water, although Dean never said if he wants it. He shoves the glass in his hand and focuses on his own to distract him from the fact he’s practically naked- aside from his underwear and a light T-shirt- next to Dean’s triple layered form.

The shirt might have actually been Luther’s. He and Diego used to be the same in build, except for Luther always being a bit taller. And then he shot up and started gaining muscle mass like it’s getting out of style and his shirts didn’t exactly fit anymore. Or they fit barely and it just wasn’t practical. And everybody prefers the comfort of well worn, soft shirt over the stiffness and industrial smell of a new one.

“Really, what are you doing here?” He asks Dean once again.

Dean scratches the back of his neck awkwardly, “Just- okay, don’t kill me, I wanted to check up on you.”

“Ch-“ Diego blinks, “Check up on me?”

Dean nods with a wince, “Yeah. And I didn’t mean to stick around, but then I figured just leaving without letting you know I was here would make me a creep who was watching you sleep. You know?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess? Why were you checking up on me, exactly?” He wonders, leaning against the counter.

Dean winces again.

“Because of your…uh, situation.”

Diego didn’t think Dean could confuse him more, but apparently, he was wrong.

“What are you talking about? What situation?”

Dean waves a hand around the room, then gestures vaguely at him, “You know, the situation. With your family.”

Diego opens his mouth and immediately clicks it shut because however ridiculous the implication is, it is also incredibly heartwarming. Dean is really not being easy on him.

“The situation with my family,” he says flatly, numb with the overload of feelings.

“Yeah,” Dean confirms.

“You do realize that I’m the one starting the fights? Like, every time.”

“You are?”

“Yup.”

Dean frowns at him, “Why the hell do you do that if he’s gonna mop the floor with you?”

Diego scrunches his nose at that and reminds himself that Dean doesn’t know the crucial aspects of his home life- home situation? Whatever- and the factors that need to be taken into consideration whenever Luther and he fight.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’ve got a bit of a short fuse,” he says- Dean nods-, “and there’s no mopping on any side.”

Dean doesn’t look like he believes that.

“Seriously. Believe what you will, but I’m better at fighting than Luther is.”

He downs the rest of his water and sets the glass in the sink.

Dean hums, rapping his knuckles against the table lightly. His hand stills and his eyes focus somewhere on Diego’s left.

“Is that a tattoo?” He asks.

Diego casts a look at his outstretched arm, resting on the counter so that the inside of his wrist is visible to Dean. And so it the tattoo of the umbrella on it.

He regrets not wearing long sleeves.

“Uh, yeah,” he says, scrubbing a palm over it. It stopped itching a long time ago ( _years ago_ ), but even looking at it sometimes sends unpleasant shivers over his skin.

“Huh,” Dean says, leaning over from where he’s seated at the table to take a better look, “why’s the handle red?”

Diego snorts, “I’ve got no idea.”

Dad never bothered explaining why they are The Umbrella Academy, of all things (though it probably because the mansion used to be an umbrella factory, in some ancient time), so why would he bother with why is the handle of something permanently engraved into their skin red. Maybe to show that they’ve given their blood to this fucking place.

  * ●●●●



They’re trudging back towards Diego’s room when their luck runs thin. They’re in the hallway, two rooms away- when footsteps start approaching them fast and, in panic, Diego shoves Dean into a first available room- Five’s. He closes the door on Dean’s yelp and turns on his heels just in time to face Allison.

She looks at him in surprise, “What are you doing up?”

“I need to take a piss,” he scrambles for an explanation.

Allison arches an unimpressed eyebrow at him, “Classy, Diego.”

“I try, sis,” he deadpans back, then frowns at her when it becomes obvious she’s waiting for him to make a move, “and what are you doing up?”

“I went to the bathroom,” she says simply.

Diego nods and they spend a moment longer staring at each other, then Allison gives up and slips past him with a sigh. He counts to five, making sure she’s not spying on him and opens the door to Five’s room. He hasn’t- God, he hasn’t been in there in years.

There’s no dust anywhere, and everything is meticulously tidy, except for that one part of the wall next to the desk where Five’s formulas stand, scribbled and crossed out with a pen. Dean is looking at the tall shelf of quantum physics textbooks and notebooks filled with equations.

“That’s some heavy reading material,” Dean comments, “who’s room is this?”

“It was Five’s.”

“Oh. He’s the one that went missing?”

“Yeah,” Diego says, sitting down on his bed. He’s half expecting Five to pop up and shoo him out because _he’s busy, can’t you see?_

“The room’s clean.”

Diego hums, “Yeah, Mom still cleans it.” Ben’s and Klaus’ rooms too, he bets.

Dean turns one of the textbooks in his hands, opens a random page and blinks in confusion before setting it back on its place.

“When did he go missing?”

Diego wraps a stray thread around his index finger and says, “When we were 13. He got into a fight with Dad, left and…and he was just gone.”

He remembers it like it happened yesterday. How everyone was a bit stunned when he just up and left in the middle of the breakfast, but then simply assumed he needed a bit to cool off. How they shared glances during lunch, and how they eyed his empty seat anxiously during the dinner. How dread settled in his stomach when he realized Five is not coming back. How furious he was when Dad hung up that painting and never so much as mentioned him again.

“What was he like?”

“Genius and an arrogant idiot.”

“Idiot because he left?”

Diego’s eyes sweep over the room once more and settle on him. He snorts, “Idiot because he’s my brother.”

“It’s a term of endearment,” he says lightly because he had enough reminiscing for one night and stands up.

Dean snorts in response.

 “Said he was arrogant too,” Dean prompts as they near toward the door.

Diego shrugs, “He was smarter, for sure. But we couldn’t say that out loud, he’d become unbearable.”

  * ●●●●



“So your mom really cleans this whole fucking castle every day?” Dean asks once they’re safely in Diego’s room again.

He quirks an amused smile at Dean’s description of the Academy, but nods anyway, “Yeah.”

Dean gives a low whistle- aiming a sheepish grin at Diego’s glare- and says, “Damn. What is she like?”

Diego throws himself on his bed, “What is this? Twenty questions about family? If so, it’s my turn to ask.”

 “You already know everything about my family,” Dean says and sits cross-legged on the floor next to Diego’s bed. “Your mom,” he reminds Diego.

“She’s great. Really nice,” Diego says, not trusting himself to say much more before it turns into gushing about her.

“Yeah?” Still, Dean prompts, intrigued and propped up on his forearms against the edge of the bed.

“Yeah. Even if she’s not, you know, my biological mom, she’s- she’s Mom,” Diego responds with an awkward shrug.

“That’s cool,” Dean sighs, looking into the distance wistfully. Diego knows his mom died- or, was killed, more correctly- when Dean was four. And it’s some twisted irony, that Dean lost his at the same time that Diego got his.

“It is,” he agrees.

A short silence, then Dean lies down on the floor, bunching up his jacket behind his head.

He says, “My mom used to sing Hey Jude to me when I was a kid. Your done something like that?”

Diego grins, “Just those lullabies from parenting books that stimulate brain activity.”

Dean barks out a quiet laugh, “Oh, man, seriously?”

Diego hums, a fond smile playing at his lips. Dean falls silent with a sigh.

They lay in silence again for a bit, and when Diego figures that Dean is just apparently going to sleep over, he scoots closer to the window and says, “Get in.”

Dean’s head pops up from the edge of the bed and he asks, startled, “Huh?”

“You want to sleep on the floor?”

“You want to share?” Dean retorts.

Diego sighs, “Oh, don’t worry. If you’ve got cold feet and you poke me with them, I’m tossing you back on the floor.”

“That sounded weirdly practiced,” Dean comments, climbing to his feet and toeing off his boots.

Diego grins, “It’s hilarious that you know I have six siblings and think I never shared the bed with any of them.”

Dean snorts and carefully lies down on his side of the bed, head in the pillow and dead to the world in a few minutes.

Diego aims a look out the window, and he can’t see Ben’s statue from his position, but he hopes the connection goes through to his brother anyway as he thinks to himself, _Oh, fuck_. He and Dean are in the same bed.

He did not think this through.

  * ●●●●



When he wakes up, it’s to a startled elbow in the ribs and his alarm clock beeping, sound mixed with Dean’s swearing. He blindly reaches a hand out to turn it off and accidentally smacks Dean in the face, by the sound of it.

He sinks back into the mattress, floating somewhere between almost-awake and dozing off and just soaking in additional warmth because he knows that, as soon as his brain comes back online, his low-key panic about sharing the bed with Dean will return.

And it’s not so easy to hide a flush in daylight.

Still, he feels Dean shifting, waking up and stretching. “Why-“ he breaks off into a yawn, “the hell do you have an alarm set for 7:30? Jesus.”

The weight moves as Dean sits up and then there’s a pause, and- “ _What the fuck is that?_ ”

Diego blinks and squints up at Dean, who is staring out the window like he saw- well, not a ghost because that’s a fairly regular sight in his line of work but something freaky.

He kisses sleep goodbye and sits up as well and- oh.

“That’s Ben,” he tells Dean.

“Ben? Like, Ben Ben?” Dean wonders awkwardly.

Diego makes a face at him, “That makes zero sense.”

“Like,” Dean makes a loose fist with one hand and points in it with other, “is Ben, like, inside?”

It takes Diego a moment to understand and then he’s shrieking, “What?! No!”

Dean raises his hands in surrender, “Okay, okay! Christ.”

“Dude, what- _what the hell?_ ”

Dean makes a strangled noise in his throat, “Look, in my defense, your family is kinda weird and from what you told me, I wouldn’t put it past your dad.”

“We’re not that weird,” Diego protests, ignoring the whole bit about superpowers and robot moms, “and also, thanks for giving me nightmares.”

“Sorry,” Dean responds sheepishly.

Diego huffs, giving a full body shudder as his eyes settle on the statue again. Yeah, he’s so having nightmares from that.

“You’ve got problems, you know,” he informs Dean.

“I said I was sorry, you don’t need to be rude.”

  * ●●●●



Dean doesn’t know how Diego does this every day, he thinks, watching him paddle around his room. It’s too early to be awake, especially if you have a permanent residence and don’t have to go to school. Which is strange because they’re the same age- save for Diego being a bit younger since he hinted that his birthday is in fall- and Dean is technically still supposed to be in school.

“Hey, did you drop out of school?” He wonders out loud.

“Huh? No,” Diego responds, stepping into a pair of dark sweatpants and Dean watches as the line of tan skin disappears as he pulls them up.

“I was homeschooled,” Diego adds and it takes Dean a moment to remember what he asked.

“Oh,” he says, “of course you were.”

He honestly doesn’t know why he didn’t assume that right away.

Diego puts on his socks and sneakers and spins on his heels before his eyes fall on a shirt slung casually but not carelessly over a chair near the wall. He takes off the T-shirt he slept in and Dean’s eyes zero on the dozen or so scars scattered on his torso and back. They’re all thin, neat scars- with a few stray, slightly jagged ones here and there-, consequences of a flawless stitch job, pale in comparison to Diego’s tan skin tone. Dean eyes them curiously; he already knows about the ones on his hands, the clutter of tiny ones on his knuckles and fingers. They’re strangely endearing, Dean dares to think, fit Diego like a second skin, what with his love of knives and so.

He pulls the new shirt on and says, “The training goes on for ages, but I’ll bring you some breakfast. Uh, please don’t leave the room?”

Dean shrugs because _fuck it, he’s going back to sleep_.

Diego must have noticed because he mutters, “Right,” and throws a last mournful look at his bed before dashing out.

Dean collapses back into the covers, stretching now that there’s no fear of accidentally bumping Diego, and he’s working his way into decent slumber when the door opens and he shoots off the bed.

Diego’s mom- out of all people, holy crap- looks at him, a mild smile on her face, and then, recognizing him, smiles wider, more sincere.

“Oh, hello,” she greets, hefting a basket of clothes into her arms like it weights nothing. She’s wearing heels for housework, damn.

“Yeah, uh, hi. I’m, um-“ he stops, lost for words. What does he say?

Diego seemed pretty pleading when he asked him to stay in the room and now this happens.

“Um, can you…not tell anyone I’m here?” He asks on a limb, remembering how she bailed them out and considering that Diego didn’t mention it again, he assumes his mom didn’t tell anyone about it.

She smiles, “Of course! You just settle and give me a minute, I’ll bring you something to eat. Eggs and bacon sound good?”

“Uh, yeah. Thanks,” he says.

She acknowledges him with another smile and a tilt of her head and leaves as swiftly as she arrived.

Dean blows out a breath and plops down on the bed again. She’s pretty- gorgeous, even- and that 50s look is actually cute, though besides that Dean can see why Diego seems attached to her. She’s weird, okay? Dean doubts she’s past 30 and she’s a housewife to some old, rich asshole and rising seven- or, well, less now- children. All that with a smile on her face. And it’s not even that. Dean can’t describe it, but there’s just something strange about her he can’t pinpoint, although there’s this, like, this inherent goodness in her. Motherly warmth at its finest.

Not even completely out of his musing, the door opens again and she walks back in with a tray. The food looks delicious. Dean is not sure eggs and bacon have the right to look so good.

“Here you go!” Diego’s mom- and he has to ask for a name because calling her Diego’s mom is kinda weird- sets the tray on the nightstand.

“That looks great, thanks,” he says.

“You’re welcome,” she responds with a smile and is off again.

Dean digs in with vigor- and yeah, it tastes as good as it looks- and, because he doesn’t feel like sleeping anymore, takes a look around Diego’s room.

The two walls across the bed have wooden paneling- pierced by what Dean can safely assume were Diego’s knives- reaching up to the half of their height, and then it transitions to the dark, moss green color, same as the other two walls. There’s a closet, and a desk with a chair, nightstand, then bed.

That’s pretty generic, but there’s a small poster taped to the wall, askew, in black and white and spelling Prime 8, and underneath the bed, there’s a big metal case filled to the brim with knives and a stray, pink hair tie all the way in the corner, near of the bed legs.

Diego doesn’t strike him as a type to grow out his hair, but then he remembers that he also has two sisters…and Klaus, and lets it go.

With all that filed away in his mind, he sits back on the bed and looks out the window. And promptly swallows his fucking tongue.

There are three figures in the yard- not counting the creepy Ben-statue. A dark-skinned girl with long, curly hair and a blond guy that could be a damn brick house for all that he’s tall and jacked way more than a 17-year-old should be. He realizes, faintly, that that’s Luther. Must be. His respect for Diego’s apparent fighting skills, stubbornness, and sheer stupidity for repeatedly knocking heads with that guy suddenly amplifies.

But that’s all in the back of his head because Diego is stretching, up on the tips of his toes, then bending down to touch his hands to his feet. He shakes out his limbs and Dean can’t really see but he knows he’s doing that thing where he’s popping every single one of his knuckles. It’s like a tic or a well-practiced habit.

He might have zoned out a bit because he doesn’t hear a knock and jerks away from the window as the door opens. Vanya looks at him, not at all surprised.

“Hi,” she says.

“Hi, what’s up?” Dean asks.

Vanya shrugs. She seems a bit reclusive, but altogether pleasant to be around. At least from the impression that Dean got.

“Wanna listen to me play? The training does draw on into infinity,” she tells him.

And Dean wants to say no because he wants to see Diego’s famous fighting skills in action and he knows shit about classical music, but it looks like this is important to Vanya and _ugh_ , she has a set of puppy eyes to compete with Sam’s.

“Yeah, sure.”

When they exit Diego’s room, the door to the one next to his is open and Dean can see their mom puttering around inside. There are Christmas lights strung around the walls that are scribbled up with words on pretty much every available inch. He blinks at the messy handwriting in blue, green, black, pink and other various colors. Like whoever wrote all that just snatched the first thing that was near at the time.

Vanya catches him looking and says, “That’s Klaus’ room.”

It makes much more sense now, Dean thinks.

And speaking of rooms, Vanya’s is a simple gray color matched with one wall made of plates of stone- which looks kind of cool, he has to admit.

She takes her violin and looks at him, “Any wishes?”

“You can do AC/DC?”

She grins and starts playing Thunderstruck.


	2. 2.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea what this chapter is. *shrug*
> 
> Enjoy! :)

As soon as the clock announces the end of the training, Diego zooms through the house as fast as he can and shimmies into the bathroom before Luther or Allison can call dibs. He’s got a headache pulsing weakly in the back of his head, a result of his mind not being completely “in the game”. It’s not his fault his thoughts kept straying to Dean, practically alone in the house, and the portraits and the Umbrella Academy memorabilia. And how, if Dean took a stroll through the wrong hallway, this could all fall into the water.

With that in mind, he notes his room is decidedly Dean-less, the bed neatly made even though he already told Mom it’s okay, _he can make his own bed_. To his relief, though, he finds Dean with Vanya, an awestruck expression on his face.

He sneaks a grin at Vanya, already suspecting exactly what she decided to play to him and gets a proud little smile in response.

“Dude,” Dean tells him, “you’re a family of weirdos and it’s _awesome_.”

Diego snorts, a smile playing on his lips, “Thanks.”

He owes Vanya ice cream for this. She’s a lifesaver. _Possibly literally_.

  * ●●●●



“Do you sleep all afternoon when you’re not with me?” Dean asks him after he’s finished his lunch. Mom brought him a tray up in Diego’s room and left them with a conspiratory wink and Diego has nowhere to be, no case to solve, so he can allow himself a nap, right?

“Not always,” he responds, cheek smushed into the pillow.

Dean hums disbelievingly.

“Really,” Diego persists, then wonders, “when are you leaving?”

Dean sobers up a bit, “Sammy managed to wrestle another week out of Dad. We’re probably leaving on Friday after Sam’s done with school. Why, you getting sick of me?” He ends with a joke.

“I thought your dad doesn’t do that ‘postponing leaving’ thing.”

“He doesn’t. I don’t know what has gotten into him. Not that I’m complaining, pies in that Griddy’s place are to kill for,” Dean says and Diego rolls his eyes because yeah, everybody knows how much Dean loves pie.

“Okay, well, what do you plan on doing until you leave?”

Dean shrugs, “Dunno. What are the fun things to do here?”

_God, Diego has no fucking clue_.

  * ●●●●



That night, Diego is alone when the familiar paddle of footsteps creaks through the hallway. He listens to the well-known rhythm; down the hall, around the corner- down the stairs. And that is, that is wrong.

He frowns into darkness and gets out of the bed to go investigate.

In a dimly lit lobby, he arrives at the top of the stairwell just in time to see the swoop of Allison’s hair as she sneaks out. The door closes with a quiet click and then- silence.

He blinks at the door for a moment longer, looks down at his hands to figure out if he’s dreaming, and still can’t believe he just saw Allison sneak out in the middle of the night. Without Luther, no less.

The fact pokes at his mind all the way back to his room, to his bed, and he can’t completely shake it off even when Allison shows up for breakfast the next morning, fresh as a daisy.

  * ●●●●



“Where did you disappear to yesterday?” He asks her after lunch, leaning on the doorway to her room.

She looks up from her phone, eyes flicking to the wall separating her and Luther’s rooms, and then they settle on him.

“What?” She asks, faux confused. Don’t get him wrong, Allison is not a bad liar, but it’s hard to bullshit someone you grew up with. Especially when they know all of your tells.

“Last night. I heard you sneaking out,” he says, leaving out the “and saw you sneaking out” part.

She shakes her head, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Diego.”

“You’re sure?”

She blinks at him, “Yeah.”

  * ●●●●



“S-she lied through her teeth and to my face,” he tells Dean over dinner, stabbing a piece of pie crust on his fork and pointing it at him.

“Do you know why?” Dean asks, eyeing his fork worriedly.

Diego huffs, “No idea. But she was out the whole night because I didn’t hear her coming back in, though she came in for breakfast.”

“Maybe she’s seeing a guy- like you are,” Dean jokes and Diego snorts and focuses on Allison rather than the little fantasy that that sentence brings.

“She already has a guy,” he says. _A guy that also has no idea where she went_ , Diego bets.

Dean shrugs, “Maybe she went for a walk. Or to a party, or something. Hey, maybe she’s working on a secret case, huh?”

It was supposed to be a joke again, but Diego swears.

“Fuck,” he says, dropping his fork on the plate.

Dean looks at him, eyebrows raised, “Wait, seriously? I thought that was your thing?”

Diego makes a noise that even he himself doesn’t know how to interpret and strings up another swear in his head. Allison doesn’t know about the monsters and there is _a zillion_ ordinary cases she could be working on.

He groans, “How the hell am I supposed to know what she’s working on?”

“Why don’t you just let her be?”

“What?”

Dean tilts his head, “You seem pretty serious about keeping them out of your business. How come you’re so invested in hers?”

_Because I’m Two. Second in charge. Second oldest_ , he almost says but bites down on response and shrugs.

“Because something could happen to her and nobody would have any idea.” He says, not even lying.

Allison and he have precisely two things in common; the last name- thus siblings as well, and they both don’t like onions. That’s it. But still, she’s his sister and they’ve been lessening in numbers as it is. Five is gone, and so is Ben. And Klaus is in the wind, who knows where. And if he’s being honest, however much Allison might be smitten by Luther, she is still the only one who can get through that thick skull of his and teach him some sense. Sometimes.

And God knows that is needed.

  * ●●●●



_“We’re gonna get in trouble,” One- or newly named Luther- says, arms crossed and that serious, ‘I’m responsible’ expression on his face._

_Diego rolls his eyes just as Klaus whines, “Oh, c’mon. It’s gonna be fun, you spoilsport.”_

_He’s swaying, probably not sober, but then again, he almost never is, lately. Ben frowns when he leans into him, but he’s noticed it as well because he doesn’t push him off. Diego wonders if anyone else notices- or cares- that Klaus is not doing okay._

_“We shouldn’t leave after nightfall. You know the rules,” Luther says back, eyebrows furrowed. The Rules that have been established after their public appearance at the bank, Luther means. Because although their identities might be a secret, there are all kinds of people hoping to snatch some superpowered kids wandering through the city after dark._

_“Jesus, Luther, it’s one night,” Diego pipes up, “pull that stick out of your ass or go back to sleep.”_

_Klaus makes a noise of delight at someone else being on his side._

_Luther’s frown deepens._

_They stand there in the hallway, a whole gaggle of them, dressed in their civies and nervous with excitement. Diego doesn’t know about the others, but he’s been itching to get out of the house, to get some fresh air and not have his every move judged by the cold bastard they call father. They’re 15, they’re young and they want to live a little._

_“What’s the worst that can happen? We’re all gonna be together anyway,” Ben adds slowly, shrugging._

_“But it’s the rule.”_

_Diego closes his eyes and counts down in his head just like Mom taught him to do when he feels like smacking some sense into his brother._

_“Luther,” Allison says, an arm linked with Vanya’s, “maybe we could forget the rules tonight, hm? It’s just one night anyway.”_

_Luther’s resolve visibly cracks because it’s Allison._

_“And we’ll be careful. Let’s do this; buddy system, huh? We’ll never break apart from the group, and if we do, we do so in a pair and we tell the others beforehand.”_

_Murmurs of agreement all around and Luther’s shoulders sag with defeat. He looks kinda funny, Diego thinks, standing there in his pajamas and barefoot while the rest of them are ready to go out._

_He sighs, “Okay-“_

_Klaus whoops quietly._

_“-but just this one time.”_

_Then he goes to get dressed._

  * ●●●●



Diego spends the whole morning the next day in the public library, sifting through cases that might catch Allison’s attention. It is useless because there’s just too much of everything. To get to even some semblance of organized, it would take him days and that’s the time not worth wasting on digging through shit like property feuds and cats- however fluffy and cute- stuck in fucking trees.

He leaves the library cranky, knowing he’ll get shit for missing training again, and still empty handed. Add Klaus not calling in a long while into the mix and he’s really in no mood to be around people today.

Then, as if struck by some ironic lightning of coincidence he runs into Allison.

She takes one look at him, wide-eyed and gripping a notepad in her hand, and turns on her heel like she can escape him while he’s literally four steps away from her. He catches up to her without a sweat, easily falling into step with her. She could run, but that would draw attention to her; something she obviously doesn’t want.

“What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing.”

She huffs, annoyed at him, and shoves the notepad in her jacket’s pocket. He wonders what was her excuse to leave the house. Diego generally doesn’t bother with much more than “Mind your own business,” but that would just make others suspicious in her case. Everybody knows Diego is hiding something (though they probably suspect it’s Klaus now) and doesn’t want anyone intruding, but Allison doesn’t want that. If her stunt the other night was anything to go by, she wants complete and utter _undetectedness_. To fly under the radar, so to speak.

“What?” She asks, narrowing her eyes at him.

“Just wondering what’s going on with you,” he says.

“Why? Are you worried?” She taunts, likely not thinking that _yeah, he is_.

“No,” he scoffs, “it’s just that for someone always giving me shit for my disappearance acts, you’re cutting awfully close to acting just like me,” he responds.

Allison blanches in shock. “I am _nothing_ like you,” she says, “and if you have to know, I’m helping Mom with grocery shopping.”

Diego raises his eyebrows at her, eyes flicking to a shoe store sign they stopped under, “Oh? I take it we’re having ankle boots for lunch today?”

Allison gives him one of her withering looks, lips pressed tight, and turns on her heel to keep walking down the street. Diego follows.

“You know, vigilante or not, you should stop shoving your nose where it doesn’t belong,” she throws over her shoulder after some time.

“And you should stop working behind Dad’s and Luther’s back. You’re one of the golden kids, after all,” he returns.

They stop in front of an actual grocery store this time, and Diego sees Mom loading bags of groceries into the backseat of “her” car. When she turns and spots them, she blinks at Diego’s presence and then her mouth stretches into a smile.

“Diego! Are you coming home with us?” She asks throwing a brief look at Allison. Diego frowns for a second. Mom’s in on whatever Allison’s doing, he’s sure of it.

“Yeah,” he responds slowly,” I could use a lift.”

Allison scowls, like that doesn’t really work with her plans, and gets into the car.

  * ●●●●



He helps Mom with unloading and putting away the groceries because, despite her claims of helping Mom, Allison trudges up to her room as soon as they arrive home.

So the opening to ask what he’s curious about appears sooner than he thought it would.

“Hey, Mom, is Allison okay?”

Mom freezes where she’s poised to put a jar of peppers in the cupboard with spices then smiles at him reassuringly.

“Oh, yes, I’m sure she’s fine. It’s just those teenage years getting to her, you know how that is,” Mom says.

Diego knows how it is- and it’s definitely not like this. He doesn’t say that though.

“Yeah. But...” he trails off, not sure how to say he’s worried without _outright_ saying he is. He chews at the inside of his cheek in thought, hating how words just wouldn’t come to him when he needs them the most.

Mom smiles at him, setting her hand on his shoulder and rubbing her thumb over his collar bone in comfort.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure your sister is going to be alright, sweetie,” she tells him. And then winks conspiratorially, a knowing gleam in her eyes.

  * ●●●●



Later that day, he leads Dean through a maze of alleys to a small, hole-in-the-wall dinner he found a while ago.

(He may or may not have discovered it after falling into a dumpster in the back while wrapping up a mission in an apartment two stories up but Dean doesn’t ask, so there’s no need for him to bring it up.)

They squeeze into a booth in the back, observing the words and doodles embodied into the walls by numerous guests. It may make the place look like a hole, but Diego thinks it kinda makes them invisible. Like this place is so insignificant that they don’t bother with painting the walls, which at the same time makes it feel so small and unnoticed and it’s easy to forget who you are while sitting there, surrounded by bad doodles of dicks and other vulgarities.

Dean looks around dubiously, “If I get food poisoning, you’ll never hear the end of it.”

Diego rolls his eyes at him, “Shut up. You haven’t even tried anything yet.”

Dean does shut up. Especially when their food arrives and he’s too busy making pornographic noises around mouthfuls of his mac’n’cheese. Diego would be embarrassed on his behalf at the looks he gets if he wasn’t preoccupied with his jambalaya. This place has no theme whatsoever, they literally make everything and it’s amazing.

“Oh my God,” Dean finally says once he has to stop eating to get some air, “are you trying to bribe me into not leaving by feeding me food that was clearly made by _gods_?”

_Maybe._

Diego snorts, stabbing a shrimp on his fork.

“Shit, man,” Dean says, obviously at loss of words, and keeps eating.

  * ●●●●



He’s been tempted to spend the night walking aimlessly through the city with Dean but there’s still the matter with Allison that he needs to crack, so he finds himself laying on his bed in the dark, listening carefully for any noises. And he hears it, the paddle of footsteps on the floorboards, lighter than usual, more deliberate in where they fall, but not soundless however much Allison tried.

He follows after her, out of the house, down the street, and then further, through a maze of shortcut streets towards a clutter of back-alley clubs. Diego knows the neighborhood just because a good portion of his cases leads him here. Seedy shit seems to gather in this place.

He observes from afar as Allison questions seemingly random people, stepping in their way and waving around a couple of papers in her hands. Photos, he thinks. Most of those interactions end with a shake of a head, a finger pointing at someone else, which ultimately ends with head-shaking as well. She’s getting frustrated, he can tell, and also drawing attention.

She shoves the photos in her jacket, smart enough not to carry a bag in this kind of a place, and starts to stomp away, apparently giving up, when a guy approaches her.

Diego tenses up because, it’s not like Allison can’t hold her own in a fight- she’s more than capable- but he’s not sure that’s the best course of action here, taking in account the number of people giving her a stink-eye.

The guy says something and she perks up, saying something back, but the longer the guy speaks, the more her posture changes to the defensive. She’s fisting her hands, gearing up for a fight and Diego thinks this is the time for him to jump in.

He steps out of the shadows, approaching quickly and just in time for Allison to spit in guy’s face, a response to whatever he said. The guy reaches for his waistband and Diego twists his arm behind his back, his other coming up to his front and holding a knife to his face.

The guy yelps, startled.

“Easy there, no need to get rowdy,” he says, shooting a look at Allison, who’s looking at him in surprise, “we’re just looking for answers.”

“The fuck,” the guy swears, trying to slip out of Diego’s grip but he just twists his arm a little harder, causing him to grunt in pain, “you kids are playing with fire.”

Allison crosses her arms, masking her brief surprise with pure determination, “Like he said, we just want some answers and then we’ll be on our way.”

The guy huffs, “Yeah? Maybe I’ll give you the answers after you apologize, doll,” he says to Allison.

She looks extremely put off; grinding her jaw, but Diego knows she’ll do it if it gets her what she came here for. So he steps in.

“And how about you tell us what we need to know and I’ll let you keep that eyeball of yours?” He hisses, inching the blade towards his eye. He gulps and Allison gives him a hard, stubborn look.

“For starters,” she says, taking the photos out of her jacket and showing them to him, “you can tell me what you know about these girls.”

  * ●●●●



Answers safely stored in Allison’s notepad, the two of them make their way back home in mostly comfortable silence. Or maybe they’re just too tired to throw jabs at each other, who knows.

“Were you really going to cut his eye out?” Allison asks suddenly.

Diego blinks at the ground, hands shoved in his pockets and his fingers running over blades kept there. He shrugs, “I don’t know,” he admits. He thinks, if he was driven to the point where that was the only option, he would do it. It’s means to an end, after all. He knows it sounds cold and heartless and he’s afraid what it might say about him.

Allison regards him quietly, probably thinking the same.

“Why are you doing this?” He asks her, not enjoying the silence so much anymore.

“What?”

“This case. You said the first girl went missing a month ago, why’d you get involved just now?”

Allison is quiet for a moment before responding, “I only found out about it this week.”

She’s lying to him again. Badly too, this time.

He sighs, “Enough games, Allison. Just tell me what’s going on.”

She looks at him like he’s lost his mind. “What? Diego, I’m just working a case. Why are you so hung up on it? You do it all the time,” she argues.

He throws his hands up, “But that’s me! I’m always running around chasing bad guys on the streets, you and Luther are the ones waiting for missions _worthy_ of your skills and time.”

She makes a noise of frustration, looking up at the starless sky as if to ask God what she did to deserve a pain in the ass like Diego for a brother. “Well, maybe, I think this case is _worthy of my skills and time._ ”

“And you didn’t tell Luther?” He asks disbelievingly.

“I don’t tell him everything!”

“Oh, you’re full of shit, Allison.”

“I am full of shit? What about you, mister Mind-your-business? God forbid we ask you where you’re disappearing off to every night.”

Diego huffs. She’s right, but-

“That’s not the point-“

“Why not?” Allison asks, stopping him with a hand on his chest and setting her hands on her hips stubbornly.

“Because,” Diego starts slowly, “I’ve been acting that way for years. It’s kinda my thing if you haven’t noticed.”

She barks out a bitter laugh, “Everyone noticed, Diego. I know you’re always angry- for whatever reason- but would it kill you to tone it down for your family every once in a while?”

And wow, okay. Diego is not sure how they jumped from him sneaking out to beat up criminals, to this. And it hurts. Especially because, well, Allison is not wrong. Diego is angry. The thing is, he doesn’t know why. It just builds and no matter what he does, it’s still there.

At the lack of his response, Allison huffs, shaking her head.

“Right. Well, it’s late. Let’s just go home.”

With that, she turns and keeps walking.

  * ●●●●



_Diego doesn’t know what happened. He was training and the day was shit and now his hands sting and bleed, the drain carrying away whirlpools of pink water. And he’s shaking, he knows, can feel the tremors running through his body as tears cling to his eyelashes and drip to his forearms._

_And it’s not- he doesn’t understand-_

_What the fuck is wrong with him?_

_There are footsteps and then a knock on the door, sharp and impatient._

_“Diego! Diego, get out! You’ve been in there forever!”_

_He takes in a shaky breath, swallowing down a hiccup to shout out a, “Fuck off!”_

_The water hits directly over a big gash on his palm and he hisses, which just sends him into a new outpour of sobs._

_Fucking Christ, what is wrong with him?_

_The door cracks open and he jumps, a defensive, embarrassed flare of anger sparking in his chest and he slams the door closed with his foot, shouting, “I said fuck off!”_

_“I need to use the bathroom, you prick! Get out!” Allison shouts back._

_There are dozen fucking bathrooms in here-_

_“I don’t care! Just fuck off already!” He screams, gasping for breath immediately afterward, shaking with silent sobs and his fingers going numb with cold. How long has he been standing in there? It feels like a moment and eternity all at the same time. His chest hurts too, and he can’t tell if it’s from crying, or if he’s getting that cold, or if it’s that feeling, that anger gnawing at him and he doesn’t understand it._

_“Diego!”_

_He lets his forehead lean harshly against the mirror, his tears cold against his flushed cheeks, and doesn’t respond anymore._

  * ●●●●



Next morning, he skips the training again, and goes out to the park instead. He doesn’t want to talk to anyone and lies on a picnic table, face toward the sun that bathes him in warmth. He almost falls asleep, so exhausted that he doesn’t even care he could be robbed, and then someone nudges his ankle, hanging off the edge of the table.

He squints at Dean’s sun-kissed, freckled cheeks and concerned eyes, the sun creating a halo around his head.

“Hey, you okay?”

Diego is not sure, but he nods anyway. Dean doesn’t buy it.

“Sammy and I are going out for a bite,” he tells him, “wanna tag along?”

Diego looks around until he spots Sam leaning out through Impala’s window and waving at him, one of his hands held out to shield his eyes from the sun’s glare.

He looks back at Dean and nods again, swallowing, “Yeah, that sounds good.”

  * ●●●●



He doesn’t know when he fell asleep, but Dean is shaking him awake in the driveway of the house they’re renting.

He yawns, stretching as he gets out of the backseat.

“You could’ve just woken me up when we got to the dinner,” he says, blinking the sleep out of his eyes.

Dean shrugs, a bag of take-out in his hand, and trails after Sam towards the house. Diego follows, realizing he’s hungry as the smell wafts out from the bag.

“Hey, I’ll just eat in my room,” Sam says once they’re inside, “I, um, remembered I’ve got a school assignment I applied for,” and grabs his food before jogging up the stairs.

“Extra schoolwork,” Dean mutters, shaking his head, “that kid.”

Diego hums, unwrapping his cheeseburger.

Dean digs into his, humming in appreciation and then asking, out of nowhere, “What’s going on with you?”

Diego pauses, “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you’re all weird and stuff. This whole week. Are you still bummed by that thing with your sister?”

Diego shrugs.

“She’s working a case, but…there’s something else going on with her.”

“Okay. And?” Dean asks, sitting down at the table.

Diego shakes his head, “I don’t know. She won’t even tell Luther, and they’re joined at the brain or something. What one knows, the other knows too.”

“Huh,” Dean says.

“And this case thing?”

“I’ll help her, it’s no big deal.”

“Need an extra pair of hands?” Dean offers.

Diego appreciates it, but he imagines Dean and Allison in the same room and gets a bit lightheaded. That would be a disaster; with Dean keeping secrets like they’re gold and what with Allison being used to always getting what she wants. They’re not allowed to use their powers on each other (even though Luther and Diego repeatedly break that rule- on purpose or not), so Diego is not really worried about Allison using her rumor on him. Dean, on the other hand, means nothing to her. And there is something very wrong with the thought of Allison taking away his free will like it’s not important.

“Thanks, but I’m sure we got it handled,” he responds.


	3. 3.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, boy... that's all I'm gonna say.
> 
> Enjoy! :)

Diego is sharpening his knives in his room when a light knock interrupts him and the door creaks open just enough to allow Allison to pop her head in.

“You’re ready to go?” She asks him, tapping her fingers on the doorframe.

Diego blinks at her, spluttering, “Right now?”

Allison nods, “Yeah, right now.”

He grumbles and grabs a handful of knives to shove in his jacket before getting up from his bed. They manage to reach the door undetected, and then they run into Luther in the lobby. He looks at them in surprise, a straw of his Capri Sun sticking in his open mouth.

“Allison- where are you two going?”

“Out,” Allison says quickly- and then keeps talking, “but not together. We’re leaving the house together, but we’re not going together. I’m just going for a walk.”

_Christ_ , Diego thinks, wondering if her brain turns to mush in his presence and resisting a facepalm.

“Oh,” Luther says, shuffling, “okay.”

Diego sees that he wants to come “for a walk” with her, but Luther rarely leaves the house nowadays. He’s too wrapped up in that superhero thing, always waiting for the mission alarm to go off. It’s kinda sad and Diego doesn’t like to think about it too much or his chest starts feeling tight and uncomfortable.

“Okay,” Allison repeats, “I’ll, uh, see you later. Bye.”

Diego nods at him in goodbye just out of sheer awkwardness that this was.

  * ●●●●



There’s one guy who apparently knows what happened to the missing girls and he is not that easy to track.

First, they go to his apartment, but his mother- _yes, his mother_ \- points them in the direction of a betting shop he frequents at all times of a day- _which is so, so sad_ \- and so that’s how the two of them finds themselves in a dump that also doubles as a bar because what’s better than a cold one right after you’ve won a lottery or went completely broke.

“Am I the only one who feels out of place here?” Allison mutters, looking around with distaste in her eyes. It’s totally justified in this case, the place is really a dump.

“Nope,” Diego says, resisting a grimace at the guy that either fell asleep in a puddle of water or drools enough that it drips off the table. Literally.

They make their way to the bar, turning heads in their path because Diego doesn’t doubt that they’re a sight to behold. A beautiful girl and a guy who could be an extra in a horror movie.

Diego knows that the scar on his head is not that bad; realistically, he’d spent a fair share of time in front of a mirror after he got it, and he’s seen people who were way less lucky with the minimal scarring and the flawless stitch job. But then he thinks, _he’s 17_. He shouldn’t know shit about scarring and stitching.

And then it seems so much worse.

“Hi, we were wondering if you could help us,” Allison tells the bartender.

He scans his eyes over them, looking at them suspiciously. “No betting or drinking for minors, didn’t cha read the sign out front?” He asks them and immediately dismisses them in favor of serving a drunk at the other end of the bar.

In a rare moment of sibling telepathy, Diego and Allison look at each other and simultaneously roll their eyes.

Allison moves to follow after the bartender and asks him, “Can you tell us where Elliot Griffin is?”

It’s like someone pulled a switch over the place and everything went deadly silent for a second. Then a man shot off a stool next to them and made a mad dash towards the back exit, shoving everything in his path away.

Diego and Allison are only a beat behind him, rushing out into the alley as the hell breaks loose inside the bar/betting shop dump.

“He went left,” Allison hisses, running next to him and- miniscule headstart or not- the guy is no match for Dad’s everyday training, so they catch up to him in no time, cornering him in one of the dead-end alleys.

“We want to talk!” Allison yells and the guy pulls out a gun.

And Diego- _shit_ , Diego is so glad he noticed Allison is up to something because this would end up catastrophically if he wasn’t here. He flings one of his knives out of his pocket and the guy cries out when it hits his hand, making him drop the gun.

Allison dashes forward, kicking the gun out of anyone’s reach, and shoves him to the ground. Diego approaches them more slowly, crouching to pick up his knife.

“What do you know about the missing girls?” Allison asks, pinning the guy with a knee on his chest and hands on his shoulders, pushing him against the concrete.

“Fuck you!” The guy spits out, clutching at his bleeding hand.

Allison’s eyes go hard, like blocks of ice and she leans in to bare her teeth at him.

“I heard a rumor,” she starts and it echoes all around, making goosebumps rise over Diego’s skin, “that you told me everything you know.”

Elliot Griffin’s eyes glaze over with sick, grey sheen before clearing again, and the fight leaves his body, leaving him lying on the ground, almost frozen still.

“I’m just a go-between for these guys, I swear. I find them the girls and coerce them into coming with me and then they take them away.” He says.

“Where do they take them?” Allison asks sharply.

“I don’t fucking know. But, but there’s a handover taking place in two days, down at the docks. At midnight.” Griffin keeps talking, his eyes going wide with fear because he can’t help himself.

“Is that everything?”

“Yes, yes.” He even nods frantically.

Allison looks over at him and they both stand up. She’s more The Rumor than Allison right now, but at least they got what they came for.

  * ●●●●



“So what now?” He asks her on their walk home.

She tilts her head towards him, “We wait two days and then go save those girls.”

“Alone?”

She looks over at him, “What, you’re afraid you can’t handle it?”

Diego scoffs because it’s so typical of her to poke at him when she wants to distract him from something.

“You don’t want to call Luther? We don’t know what we’re walking into, could use his power,” he shrugs, “besides, he’d actually get out of the house.”

Allison flinches at that, knowing full well what Diego’s talking about.

“We can do this on our own. And since when do you admit needing Luther’s help?”

Diego scoffs again, “And since when do you not want him in on the case?”

Allison sniffs, “Like I said, we can do this alone. If you’re afraid, you’re free to back out whenever you want.”

Diego laughs, “You know me well enough to know I’d never do that.”

Even if he can already tell this will not end well.

  * ●●●●



He wakes up to find Dean slumped at his desk, snoring softly, and blinks at the sight, not sure if he’s sleeping or not. A glance down at his hands determines that yep, he’s awake and Dean is sleeping at his desk because the dumbass couldn’t have nudged him awake or something and asked for a bit of space on the bed.

Diego shakes his head and gets up, poking him on the shoulder.

Dean jumps out of the chair with a start, looking around and stilling once his eyes fall on Diego. “Oh, uh, morning,” he says, scratching the back of his neck.

“Morning,” Diego responds with amusement.

“Uh, what time is it?”

Diego squints at his alarm clock and says, “7 am.” Huh, he actually woke up before his alarm. Sad things happen, he supposes.

“Jesus fuck,” Dean responds, breaking into a jaw-cracking yawn.

“Take the bed, you idiot.”

Dean doesn’t even dignify that with a response, already throwing himself face-first into the mattress. He groans into the pillow and then, presumably, falls back to sleep. Lucky him.

Still-

  * ●●●●



“Hey,” he says, knocking on Vanya’s door, “um-“

“He’s here again and you need me to check up on him?” Vanya beats him to it, smiling smugly.

“…yeah. Thank you,” he responds, fighting the blush at the look she gives him.

Vanya hums, “It’s cool. He’s nice, you need more friends like him.”

Diego laughs, “I don’t think there are more _people_ like him.”

She nods, smiling.

“Is he awake?”

“He wasn’t when I left the room. I think he’ll sleep through the training, the window is closed but just in case, you know?”

Vanya nods again, shrugging, “Yeah, sure. I can read my book in your room too, anyway.”

“You know where the spare blanket is,” he tells her because he knows she has a habit of wrapping herself into a cocoon while she reads, “and thanks again.”

“You’re welcome.”

  * ●●●●



Allison is staring. Not at Diego, but at Luther. These intense glances when she thinks no one’s watching like she’s trying to burn his face into her memory.

He throws a knife at the target without even watching, focusing instead on her body language, how she lets Luther talk more and smiling sadly whenever he laughs. Diego wonders, fleeting and stomach-twisting, if something’s wrong with Luther. If he’s sick or something and somehow Allison is the only one who knows.

He shakes the thought because it disturbs him and goes to fetch his knives.

  * ●●●●



Dean is still sleeping when Diego trudges in, scrubbing a towel over his head. Vanya is curled up on the same chair where Diego found Dean in the morning, her nose in a book and angled so the sunlight from the window falls over her face. She looks up at his entrance and squints against the light.

Dean is still sleeping, sprawled over his bed.

“Are you okay? You didn’t practice as much as you usually do,” she tells him because of course she sneaked glimpses of the training between her reading.

“Hm? Yeah, I’m fine, just thinking,” he waves her off.

She hums, giving him that smug look again and Diego feels color climb to his cheeks.

“What?” He asks, defensively.

“Nothing,” Vanya shrugs, still looking at him.

“Stop it.”

“Stop what?”

“Stop looking at me like that!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Vanya says innocently and still looks at him like she knows exactly how he feels about Dean. It’s a bit unnerving, like there’s a spotlight trained on him and he wants nothing more than hide under covers or something equally childish. With Dean, preferably. _Ugh._

There’s a knock on the door and Diego zooms to the doorway to poke his head out before whoever it is can catch a sight of both Vanya and some stranger camping out in his room.

Allison takes a step back at his sudden appearance. She narrows her eyes at him, “What are you doing?”

“What?”

“You’ve got that startled look on your face. The same one you had when I caught Klaus trying out his makeup skills on you when we were 12.”

“I thought we agreed to never mention that again,” he responds, hoping to distract her. And besides, it wasn’t the first time Klaus tried that, so it didn’t even look so terrible. The first time he talked- _annoyed_ \- Diego into being his guinea pig, it was a complete disaster.

Allison gave him her ‘that’s-not-the-point-and-you-know-it’ look, arms crossed.

Diego sighs, “You needed something?”

Allison purses her lips, nodding, “I need to talk to you.”

“Oh,” he says, stepping out of the room fully and closing the door behind him, “okay.”

“Let’s go to the kitchen.”

  * ●●●●



Mom’s humming to herself, making lunch and seemingly minding her own business, but Diego knows she can hear everything they say.

“You’re not thinking about telling Luther about the case, are you?” Allison asks him across the table.

Diego wasn’t, but since she brought it up, “Maybe he should know.”

“No,” Allison responds firmly, “we can do this. I would’ve done it on my own if you didn’t start prying.”

Diego graciously doesn’t bring up the fact she’d get shot if it wasn’t for him.

“And if we can’t? Wouldn’t it be good to have someone know where we are if things go south?”

Allison squirms.

“We can tell Vanya.”

“Yeah, because Dad and Luther will really listen to her.”

Allison slumps in her seat, knowing it’s true. Dad just outright ignores her, and Luther, while still protective of her, doesn’t see her as capable to contribute to the team. It’s all bullshit, but it’s not like Diego can change that because they hardly listen to him as well.

“Mom knows,” Allison says then.

Mom, at the mention of her, turns to give him a reassuring smile over her shoulder.

Diego sighs. The thought from earlier tugs at his mind, pulling at the loose thread and sending words out of his mouth before he can think about it.

“Is Luther dying?”

“What?!” Allison almost shrieks, eyes nearly popping out of her skull.

“You don’t want him in on this because he’s sick?”

“Diego wha- no! No, he’s fine. God, how’d you get to that?”

Diego shrugs, feeling silly and justified at the same time, “Well, there’s a reason you’re hiding it from him.”

Allison doesn’t deny it. “It’s not- it’s not because of that.”

“Then why?”

She sighs.

“Just don’t tell him.”

Diego is ready to argue because _fuck that_. He hates being kept in the dark, especially when his gut is telling him it’s something important. But before he can voice his opinion, Vanya slinks into the kitchen, going straight to the counter to grab a cookie out of a jar.

“Hi,” she greets and throws a meaningful look at him over Allison’s shoulder, jerking her head towards the door subtly.

_Oh._

Diego resolves to just letting this be for now and stands up. He’s got a curious, supernatural- hunting friend in his room.

“I’m going to my room,” he says, already retreating.

Dean is stretching, rolling his shoulders with a groan when he enters the room.

“Two questions; how do you get in and what drained your batteries?” Diego asks him right off the bat.

Dean yawns, “Your locks are shit,” which, _yeah, true_ , “and there was The Terminator marathon on TV last night. After midnight.”

Diego raises his eyebrows at him, “You spent the whole night watching movies?”

Dean blinks at him, “The Terminator trilogy, Diego.”

At Diego’s blank look, he elaborates, “Like, the best trilogy there is. Actually, I think there should be another movie in making…”

“Huh?”

“You know, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sarah Connor, Skynet…”

“Nuh-uh,” Diego shakes his head, giving him a lost look, “you’re just talking nonsense at me right now.”

Dean goes very still and Diego thinks he would stare at him for a full minute if he hadn’t prompted him with, “What?”

“Are you telling me,” Dean starts, disbelieving, “that you’ve never seen The Terminator?”

Diego shakes his head again.

“Oh my God,” Dean says, eyes wide, “ _oh my God_. Diego, you just- I can’t even.”

  * ●●●●



The time passes faster than Diego expected it to and then it’s Thursday. He still feels like something will go wrong, can sense it like a rock in the pit of his stomach. For a moment, he contemplates telling Luther anyway, _to hell with everything_ \- but in the end, he just tosses a handful of knives in every pocket he has and leaves the house with Allison.

They don’t talk on their way to the docks; Diego low-key mad and still trying to figure out what’s going on with Allison, and Allison lost in her own world, thinking about who knows what. The air is uncharacteristically warm and damp, making him feel like he’s breathing through a mouthful of cotton.

He doesn’t know what to expect and his thoughts keep ping-ponging between Allison, and Luther, and Dean, and he wonders what will become of this night.

The air is even damper when they arrive at the docks, waves gently rocking against the concrete. Further down, away from the lights, Diego spies two guys standing guard in front of a warehouse building. Bingo.

He ignores the alarm bells going off in the back of his mind, gripping a knife in his hand, and exchanges a look with Allison before they slink through the shadows towards the looming building.

He just manages to shoot off a text to Dean before they jump into the frying pan.

The element of surprise is on their side, the guards easily subdued, but then two guys turn into a dozen and in their hurry to not get shot, they get separated. Allison, armed with determination and a crowbar, sets off to find the missing girls, and Diego is left to deal with the brutes.

He swears, flinching as bullets ricochet off the metal pipes and crates, a stray one once in a while actually hitting the concrete pillar he’s hiding behind, sending little pieces of it flying and dust creating dry mist in the room. He doesn’t know how many guys there are left, but he blindly throws a pair of his knives over his shoulder, imagining jugulars in his head, and notes strangling grunts of pain piercing through a cacophony of bullets.

“Fuck!” He hears someone shout, footsteps, “I think he’s outta knives!”

_Not even close_ , Diego thinks, flipping one in his hand and plunging it into the side of a guy that thought he was being sneaky. He lets him fall to the ground with a thud and wrestles the gun out of his convulsing fingers. He might prefer knives, but it’s not to say that guns are totally useless.

He fumbles with the magazine, fingers bumping over ridges of every bullet he extracts, piling them in his lap with a notion there are not that many left before putting them back in and shoving the magazine back into the gun. By then, he’s already thrown two more knives. He knows where he wants the bullets to hit, but there’s still a single guy remaining when they run out.

He chucks the empty gun on the floor, running after the man that took off through a side entrance. It’s thoughtless and stupid, and his own fault because he doesn’t check, _doesn’t even think to check_ if the guy’s waiting for him by the door or behind one of the shipping containers, and flinches hard enough to feel his heart stutter in his chest when a bullet whizzes past his head- a flick of a wrist and the guy is down- and then something cold and hard hits him across the head. He tumbles down to the ground, knees involuntarily giving out in shock as his ears fill with high pitched ringing and the back of his head blooms with pain. He doesn’t even hear the pair of pliers clattering to the ground next to him.

He rolls to his back, head spinning like a carousel on maximum speed, and blinks at the fuzzy face above him. In and out of focus, lighter, then dimmer, like that damn flickering light bulb in the mansion-

A gun glints in the faint, artificial light, and he thinks that somewhere, muted and far away, someone calls his name.

His ears still ring on intervals; high pitched, then footsteps and “Diego!”, and then the noise, and “I heard a rumor-“, and then nothing before a body collapses next to him, gun in a limp hand and dead eyes staring at him.

_Well, fuck you_ , he thinks through a fog, feeling hands patting him down and holding his head gently as he tries to lift up on his elbows- mostly unsuccessfully. It gets cushioned on something and the familiar scent of Allison’s shampoo fills his lungs as her arms envelop him into an embrace, one hand petting his face while the other combs shaky fingers through his short hair.

He feels warm- with embarrassment or affection, he can’t tell- and thinks, _he doesn’t need to be coddled, for fuck’s sake, he’s fine_ , but he can’t really feel his mouth at the moment. And he’d rather not have his head dropped back on the ground.

The sound slowly drips back in, the waves crashing to their right and Allison making shushing noises at him, saying, “Look at me, Diego. C’mon, I’m sorry, look at me.”

Diego drags his eyes over pitch black sky, making contact with Allison’s, uncharacteristically shiny ones. Just for a moment though, because the pain pulsing in his head is only getting worse with each twitch of his eyeballs. He groans. Allison sniffles.

And then a sound, a whisper first, then louder until it has Allison going rigid and clutching at him harder.

“Diego!” Someone shouts, and it’s- Diego knows that voice.

_Dean._

Allison’s fingers disappear from his hair and make a grab for the gun laying on the ground. Diego makes a distressed noise in his throat because fuck, Allison is going to shoot Dean.

He makes a half-hearted attempt to bat it out of her hand, mumbling out, “’S fine. Don’t shoot.”

“Diego!” He can hear footsteps now too.

“Stay back!” Allison yells.

Diego wants to stand up, or sit up, or whatever’s easier because he’s realizing Dean will see him like this, babied by his sister and lying on the ground like a helpless, small animal. He tries to move, but Allison can be damn strong when she wants to be, holding him still with her free arm, head cushion on her lap and against her stomach.

“Whoa, easy,” he hears Dean say, and then with a voice heavy with concern, “is he okay?”

Allison squeezes him, “He will be. Who are you?”

“Dean,” Diego says before he can introduce himself. He doesn’t even have to look at Allison to know she’s giving him her confused and suspicious look. He can feel it on his skin.

“Diego, are you okay?” Dean asks him and the following footsteps show that he’s completely disregarding Allison’s warning.

He grumbles in response, trying to sit up again. This time, Allison allows it, helping him up. He bends his legs slightly and then Dean swoops in as well, so between the two of them, they manage to hoist Diego back on his feet- even though his brain is doing somersaults in his skull.

“My car’s that way,” Dean says and they- or well, _Diego_ starts stumbling, Allison and Dean supporting him from either side.

  * ●●●●



The drive is mostly silent, at least for Diego because he spends it precariously on the edge of consciousness and falling asleep to escape the headache building in the back of his head and reaching around to his temples and forehead like a crown. Allison is carding her fingers through his hair again, expression tight and pale whenever he sneaks a glance at her. Diego doesn’t shove her away because he has a feeling it’s more to calm her down than anything else. She’s strangely quiet, not asking a single question beyond where they are going.

Dean is flicking his eyes at them in the rearview mirror every now and then, offering a reassuring grin whenever his eyes meet Diego’s. Diego isn’t even surprised by how it helps him relax.

  * ●●●●



They place Diego on a couch with a firm order not to move, and then Dean’s practically jogging out of the motel room to grab the first aid kit from his car.

“I’m sorry,” Allison says when they’re alone.

Diego shrugs because, really, “You couldn’t know.”

“Still,” she mutters, petting his hair again. It’s a very motherly move that Diego will be kind and not tease her about.

She flicks her eyes to the door, “How do you know him?”

“We met on a case a while back. The one I took after Ben d- after Ben died.”

“Oh,” she says quietly, “is he your friend?”

“Yeah,” Diego says, can’t control the small, upward tug of his lips.

Allison hums but doesn’t say anything else. Her thoughts are somewhere else.

But before Diego can dig into that, Dean returns

“Alright, let’s see if you need stitches,” he says, cheerfully in a way of a man who’s not terrified of needles and in immediate danger of having one in his skin soon.

“Ugh,” he says and Allison grips his wrist like she actually believes he’s stable enough on his feet to make a run for it.

“What?” Dean asks curiously.

“He’s afraid of needles,” Allison tells him and Dean looks at him in surprise.

“ _You’ve got a tattoo._ ”

“Ugh,” Diego repeats and feels Allison rub his forearm in solidarity. She helps him sit up and then takes a seat on a small coffee table in front of the couch while Dean pokes and prods at his head.

“You’re really something else, Hargreeves,” Dean tells him.

“I try,” Diego responds between hisses. One of Dean’s hands is resting on his shoulder and Diego can’t remember if they’ve touched each other unless it was during a fight or saving each other’s asses during hunts. The touch is setting his nerves alight where they’re touching skin-to-skin.

Dean chuckles in response and says, “Well, you’re lucky. No need for stitches-“ oh, thank fuck, “you’ll just have a bitch of a headache to deal with.”

“Ahead of you, I already have a headache,” he grumps.

Dean shoves a pill in his hand and a bottle of water, “Yeah, yeah, quit whining.”

Diego grumbles some more, washes down the pill with the water and goes to pass out.

  * ●●●●



 He wakes up sometime later, to a sound of the shower running and Allison flipping through the channels, bothered expression on her face.

“What’s up with you?” He mumbles out.

She looks at him, startled just for a second, and then says, “I’m moving out.”

Which-

“What? When?”

“Tomorrow,” she says, “I-“

“Didn’t tell anyone?”

She nods, picking at her sneaker.

He frowns, “How’d you find an apartment? And what-“

“I’m going to L.A.”

Diego’s mouth clicks shut because _holy shit_. “L.A.? When the hell were you planning to tell us?”

She hunches her shoulders, looking away guiltily and something stabs him in the chest, sparking with anger, “Jesus, Allison! You were jus-just gonna leave?!”

She flinches at his tone.

“This was what? The last gig before the retirement?”

This is what all those sad looks and mystery were about.

“You have to tell Luther,” he says firmly.

Her head snaps to him, “No, Diego, I can’t.”

“If you don’t, I will.”

Her eyes fill with tears and she threatens, “No, don’t you dare. _Diego, don’t you dare._ ”

He wouldn’t. He’s not that much of an asshole, especially now that she’s practically begging him not to. But she needs a push to do it. Luther deserves a proper goodbye, face-to-face if she’s already planning to drop out of his life out of the blue.

“You have to tell him, Allison. If you care at least half as much as you claim, you’re gonna tell him in his face.”

Her face crumbles and she sniffles, nodding and clutching at the heart-shaped locket around her neck, “Okay, okay. I’ll tell him, just don’t say anything, please.”

He nods back, “I won’t.”

  * ●●●●



Dean drops off Allison back at the mansion and then they drive around for a bit, with Dean lecturing Diego about the importance of The Terminator with fervor and in great detail. He even makes him go to a blockbuster to rent all three movies because, apparently, he won’t rest until he can be sure Diego will watch them.

Diego sticks his head out the window, letting cool air clear his head of everything that’s happened today. Allison is leaving. She’s actually moving out and it’s going to be just Luther, Vanya and Diego in that huge fucking house. And Mom, and Pogo, and Dad but… but that’s not the point. The point is the new portrait, with even fewer faces than the last one.

He realizes it’s only going to be Luther, Dad and him on it. The perfect soldier and the fucked up disappointment of this so-called family.

_Shit_.

He’s going to go insane.

“Hey,” Dean tugs at his jacket’s sleeve, “you alright?”

“It’s up for debate,” Diego responds, sitting back down and rolling up the window, “Allison is moving to freaking L.A. and… I don’t know. I’ll go stir crazy with Luther.”

“What do you think about moving out?” Dean asks.

Diego chews at the inside of his cheek, “I don’t know. I mean, where exactly would I go?”

Dean shrugs-

“I was thinking about Police Academy but that’s not happening for a few years.”

“Right,” Dean agrees, fingers gripping the steering wheel, “well if you ever feel like smothering your brother in sleep, you can call me. I’ll come to keep watch.”

Diego barks out a laugh because joke or not, he needed this.

He settles against the leather seat and feels himself drift off into sleep. At one point, weariness starts playing tricks on him and making him imagine fingers interlocking with his.

  * ●●●●



Diego doesn’t tell Luther. It still ends up fucked, though.

Allison leaves without a sound. In the morning, while Diego’s in the shower and nobody else is up yet. He doesn’t even know it until he notices a note on his desk, atop a cluster of bloodstained knives he thought were left at the docks.

“Sorry,” it says, and Diego knows she’s not apologizing about bloody knives.

He rushes into the hallway and can hear Luther crying in his room, knows a similar note was what he woke up to and can’t help but feel the surge of rage because, for all of her stubbornness and determination, Allison is a fucking coward.

  * ●●●●



He barricades himself in the recording room for the afternoon, a bowl of popcorn in his lap, feet up on the desk and DVD player he dug up from the basement hooked up to one of the monitors. He’s resolved to not think about Luther or Allison or how his chest feels all knotted up and twisted, and how he’s just going to see what’s the fuss about that fucking movie-

And then Luther barges in, puffy, red eyes and pale, blotchy cheeks and blanches at the sight of Diego.

“Oh, sorry,” he sniffs, wiping his eyes, “I didn’t think anyone was here.”

And, fuck. Diego can’t just send him off now, can he? Honestly, he’s a bit worried.

He sighs, put-upon, and rolls his eyes.

“Get in, I can’t see shit on the screen with all the light coming in.”

Luther steps in and closes the door. Doesn’t sit down until Diego barks at him to _pull up a damn chair, Christ_. His brother is so awkward sometimes.

“Rule; a peep out of you and you’re out,” he tells him and shoves the bowl with popcorn in his general direction.

Luther nods, takes a handful of kernels, and asks, “What’re you watching?”

Diego counts down in his head like Mom taught him and responds, “The Terminator, part one of the best trilogy ever.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...yeah...  
> Few things for you guys: since tomorrow marks the end of my week and a half long "vacation", the updates might be less regular-ish, but I just want you to know that I haven't given up no this series and am still very much invested in it. 
> 
> Also, for the Dean/Diego shippers, I was thinking of writing a series of unrelated fics, the various meet cutes for these two. So, that's in planning, just so you know ;)
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading and I figured if you want to talk about this series or this ship, feel free to email me on agnes.clementine1314@gmail.com :)


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